Life on Normal Street: A glimpse into East Stroudsburg group home for the challenged

Monday

Jan 28, 2013 at 12:01 AM

She is ageless in unusual ways even in her 40s: Her baby teeth never fell out. Her small face looks like an older child's. She still believes she is 15.

BRENDA FULLER

She is ageless in unusual ways even in her 40s: Her baby teeth never fell out. Her small face looks like an older child's. She still believes she is 15.

On a good day, Rhonda cracks jokes with her housemates in a tidy ranch house they call home on Normal Street.

Although it is a group home for people with disabilities and special needs, it is home for them.

On a bad day, Rhonda smacks herself in the face and cries out of frustration. But mostly she and her friends are happy.

Once living with family, or institutionalized, many people with mental health challenges and disabilities have been mainstreamed from stark, hospital-like facilities into neighborhood-based group homes like the one on Normal Street.

The Normal Street home is one of 22 group and personal-care homes operated by Fitzmaurice Community Services Inc. In all, the agency helps about 500 people through a variety of programs, said Elizabeth Koster, president and chief executive officer.

Her mother, Johanna Fitzmaurice, founded the company in 1966 in East Stroudsburg by taking in six men after an institution closed in White Haven.

"I was just ready to get married, but I lived there for about a year," said Koster, a former teacher. "About the same time, my father died, and that became my mother's goal — to help these folks."

After the first six clients got jobs and moved into their own places, Koster's mother took in more people with disabilities. The effort grew, and Fitzmaurice was born.

In 1976, Fitzmaurice opened its first group home in East Stroudsburg. Koster was on maternity leave from her teaching job.

"I helped her in that group home," she said. In 1978, when her mother died unexpectedly, Koster chose to quit teaching and help disabled people full time.

"I wanted to continue where she left off," Koster said. "I got attached. They depended on me."

Now, clients like Rhonda, who never lived in an institution but was given up by her birth parents as an infant and then adopted by a Jim Thorpe couple, are living lives to the fullest.

Rhonda's diagnosis can only be described as intellectually challenged, Koster said.

Rhonda and her friends attend work and daycare programs. They dance at parties, have boyfriends, gossip and visit their aging parents. They also enhance the lives of their families, friends and caregivers.

Rhonda, who lived with her family until 1998, when her parents were unable to care for her, shares the Normal Street house with three other women.

There is Linda, who always wants to answer the phone. There is Bobbie, who does not speak, just rocks back and forth. And Pam. She laughs at Rhonda's jokes and claps her hands over her mouth when Rhonda curses.

As a child, Rhonda stopped growing physically about age 10 or 11. Her one arm is contracted into a curl. Yet, she taught herself to play the piano using one hand without ever learning to read or write, or to read music.

During a recent visit, Rhonda talked about her boyfriend, who uses a wheelchair. She saw him at a party. "I'm gonna kiss him," said Rhonda.

Without missing a beat, Rhonda adds, "You're cute."

It is one of her many stock lines.

When asked how old she is, Rhonda always replies, "Fifteen."

In Rhonda's world, she never ages. Nor can she quite comprehend death.

Rhonda talks to herself.

"Where's Mom?" she asks.

She answers her own question.

"Mom's dead," she says and her lips curl down into a pout.

There were about a half million people in group homes in 2010 in the United States, according to the federal National Council on Disabilities.

Group homes offer a sense of family, Koster said. The agency also oversees some folks who live in their own apartments.

As evidence there is a sense of family, the Normal Street ladies finish each other's sentences. They eat dinner together, go to parades and shopping. And they celebrate holidays.

During the week they attend a day program at Developmental Education Services, a private, not-for-profit agency based in Stroudsburg unconnected to Fitzmaurice.

There, they watch movies, play games and just hang out. Like most people, they have experienced deaths, illness, hospitalizations.

"They need to get a chance to (have) a life in the community," Koster said. "Prior to 1966, most people with mental illness or a disability lived in facilities."

In each living situation, Fitzmaurice tries to match people who will get along. Some housemates meet at day programs. Others are paired up by disability or compatibility.

"This can be the optimal way to live if you need help," Koster said. "The ladies at Normal Street have made it their home."

The Normal Street group home is often staffed with students from East Stroudsburg University, interns and trained and skilled staff 24 hours a day, Koster said.

When Rhonda or another client acts out, such as hitting themselves, the staff quickly intervenes and redirects them.

After she hits herself, Rhonda is apologetic.

"Sorry, sorry," Rhonda says.

She reaches out her hand, blows a kiss into the air and wiggles her eyebrows up and down until Pam laughs again.

Rhonda, one of the Normal Street residents, is the adopted sister of Brenda Marks Fuller, who wrote this story. "Rhonda came to our family as an infant and has brought so much joy to our lives," Fuller said.